I am a contractor that did the lawn service for TJ and Integrity Property Management. I started mowing his 60 lawns in 2008 when he contacted me and told me that his landscaper was not performing his duties and needed replacement. At $13 a lawn I mowed every property for the remainder of the season with no issues. He promised me the contract the following year and Aaron Beckler was my new contact person running Integrity Property Management.
After agreeing to $30 per man per hour we began to revamp all the properties in succession and made them safe again. No property was over $200 and most were billed at less than $60 to pick up years worth of neglect, glass, syringies, dirty diapers, contractors debris left on the property, we cut down brush, and gave the property the first mow.
Upon completion of 42 properties and with a bill of only 4700 for 2 weeks worth of work from 5 people he refused to pay. I had exhausted all of my money paying labor, gas, two trucks on the jobs, and had less than $100 to my name. He strong armed me into a $3000 settlement for the work that almost made me break even. He refused to pay even a portion of the bill until I signed a statement that this was all the money he owed me. Figuring that I would make up for the lost wages doing the mowing I settled. Then I was informed that he would not be using my services anymore and that someone else was cutting the lawns for $8 per mow.
Of course at the end of the season he begged me back for his new landscapers nonperformance and agreed to sign a contract for the following years mowing. When I got to the properties they looked like they had not been maintained all season. The grass was 3 ft tall and laying down on most properties. He payed his bill for the end of the season and I began work the following season.
He explained to me that he had someone else do the clean ups for $45 each but if any were not done just to bill him and he would take it out of the other guys pay. This should have been a red flag for me but $300 a week in my pocket after expenses was what I needed to give my helpers hours and it was steady work.
The mowing was being done at that point for only $10 per yard.
He was late paying me one day when all payments are due on Friday. No check was left for me and when I called him he said he was going out of town. I said our contract states you will pay all bills on Friday. He told me that if I needed to pay my help that I should get a loan like he does.
At the end of July I had invoiced him over $800 for the lawns and extra requested work and all of a sudden his wife was out and I couldn't get a check. Then when she got back he tells me that the services were not being performed to his liking. There were weeds being missed here and there and that I should be maintaining shrubs that he'd had cut down with a saw with my string trimmer. I explained to him that brush is not a weed and that my equipment does not cut brush and for $10 a lawn I couldn't ever see myself doing anything but cutting the grass and cutting actual weeds.
He demanded that I do all the lawns over again and tried to say my hired help was lying to me and not completing the lawns. He offered to ride around with me to all the properties which I gladly accepted since I had done the lawns myself. He called off and said just do the lawns again. Of course it had been almost 2 weeks since he didn't pay and I was not going to redo all the lawns that obviously needed to be done again after such a long time.
He sent a stop mowing email to me and said he would pay me for any lawns passed his visual inspection. When I stopped in for a check he told me there was no way he could give me any money until the following Monday when he could input all the lawns into his coumputer.
That Monday he had a new excuse that his new landscaper was going to visually inspect the lawns and tell him which ones had not been done correctly almost 3 weeks later. I wasn not in agreement with any of that since the whole point of the disagreement was that he had visually inspected the lawns himself. I told him to pay what he thinks he owes and I would go to court for the rest. At that point he said he would not pay me anything.
For anyone wanting to do work for him or to invest in his trumped up investors business know this:
He drives a 10 year old BLAZER, lives in a house with a roof that is ready to cave in, and is always broke. The work that he bills for is outrageous and is done by shoddy people he hires off the street. Windows are broken, properties are boarded up, and he's a scammer.
I will see him in court soon and that is all that matters.
If anyone has a similar story or wants someone who actually has integrity to help maintain their properties call me or email and i will talk with you
Jay
Jay Shorter Property Maintenance
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